TY - JOUR
T1 - Experimental Insights into the Coupling of Methane Combustion and Steam Reforming in a Catalytic Plate Reactor in Transient Mode
AU - Ashraf, M. Arsalan
AU - Tacchino, Stefano
AU - Peela, Nageswara Rao
AU - Ercolino, Giuliana
AU - Gill, Kirandeep K.
AU - Vlachos, Dionisios G.
AU - Specchia, Stefania
N1 - Funding Information:
The work of D.G.V. was supported from the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficient and Renewable Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Office under award no. DE-EE0007888-8.3. The Delaware Energy Institute gratefully acknowledges the support and partnership of the State of Delaware toward the RAPID projects.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 American Chemical Society.
Copyright:
Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/1/13
Y1 - 2021/1/13
N2 - The microstructured reactor concept is very promising technology to develop a compact reformer for distributed hydrogen generation. In this work, a catalytic plate reactor (CPR) is developed and investigated for the coupling of methane combustion (MC) and methane steam reforming (MSR) over Pt/Al2O3-coated microchannels in cocurrent and counter-current modes in transient experiments during start-up. A three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation shows uniform velocity and pressure distribution profiles in microchannels. For a channel velocity from 5.1 to 57.3 m/s in the combustor, the oxidation of methane is complete and self-sustainable without explosion, blow-off, or extinction; nevertheless, flashbacks are observed in counter-current mode. In the reformer, the maximum methane conversion is 84.9% in cocurrent mode, slightly higher than that of 80.2% in counter-current mode at a residence time of 33 ms, but at the cost of three times higher energy input in the combustor operating at ∼1000 °C. Nitric oxide (NO) is not identified in combustion products, but nitrous oxide (N2O) is a function of coupling mode and forms significantly in cocurrent mode. This research would be helpful to establish the start-up strategy and environmental impact of compact reformers on a small scale.
AB - The microstructured reactor concept is very promising technology to develop a compact reformer for distributed hydrogen generation. In this work, a catalytic plate reactor (CPR) is developed and investigated for the coupling of methane combustion (MC) and methane steam reforming (MSR) over Pt/Al2O3-coated microchannels in cocurrent and counter-current modes in transient experiments during start-up. A three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation shows uniform velocity and pressure distribution profiles in microchannels. For a channel velocity from 5.1 to 57.3 m/s in the combustor, the oxidation of methane is complete and self-sustainable without explosion, blow-off, or extinction; nevertheless, flashbacks are observed in counter-current mode. In the reformer, the maximum methane conversion is 84.9% in cocurrent mode, slightly higher than that of 80.2% in counter-current mode at a residence time of 33 ms, but at the cost of three times higher energy input in the combustor operating at ∼1000 °C. Nitric oxide (NO) is not identified in combustion products, but nitrous oxide (N2O) is a function of coupling mode and forms significantly in cocurrent mode. This research would be helpful to establish the start-up strategy and environmental impact of compact reformers on a small scale.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85100074216&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1021/acs.iecr.0c04837
DO - 10.1021/acs.iecr.0c04837
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85100074216
VL - 60
SP - 196
EP - 209
JO - Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research
JF - Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research
SN - 0888-5885
IS - 1
ER -